Bill Winfield

Doll

With a sharp shaft of wintersun in your eyes,you hand me a little doll you made mewhen the snow would get too high.Entrancing,as if on the edge of life,the doll has a luminous qualityand is intricately carvedfrom a pale, cool substancewhich, when you describe it,is unknown to me.I gaze deeplyinto its strange light, which singslike an angel, or a mummy, or an infant.You say you made it on absolute nightswhen there were no stars and no moon,no motion in the dark trees,only a huge solitude.Looking closer,I begin to recognize my own eyesstaring back, unfinished though,like small clouds moving very high up.

Years, worldsroll into a single instant of helpless love,too near to bear,and I fall into the sea from a high cliff,wondering as my mouth meetsa white wave,how many fathers I foundafter I died.